and the years have not been kind to you (but i will be)
by Cordelia Rose
Summary: Corey is four when he realises that his parents don't want him. Corey is sixteen when he meets Mason. [Interludes in Corey's background up until we see him on the show, basically.]


hey guys

so

i love corey

like, too much

and both him and morey (mason/corey, idk if they have that ship name or if i just created it)

are ruining my life slowly

and i feel like it's kind of a travesty there's so little fics based around just them

and so little background given about them on the show?

like for example corey has to be a biological chimera, right, yet we never learn how?

anyway

this fic is garbage, a mess, etc., but i hope you enjoy

i'm not sure if the format of this works, or if it even reads well? it's literally 2am and i've spent 1and1/2hours writing this non stop with a very vague check over afterwards, so probably many mistakes, also probably very badly written

* * *

Corey is four when he realises that his parents don't want him.

In hindsight, four years is quite a long time to take to figure this out. Corey guesses that his parents are right when they said he's stupid. It's not as if they ever did normal parent things with him, like taking him out to places or making him breakfast or making sure he has clothes.

Corey must be stupid then.

This bothers him less than he thought it would; in fact, it barely bothers him at all. Right now he's more worried about the spider that he saw scuttling around near to his feet, and about his stomach that's growling with hunger. It feels like it's eating itself from the inside out, and Corey decides to undertake another useless search for food in the deserted pantry. It's cold in here.

He remembers his grandmother visiting and clucking her tongue at that, saying that the whole point of a pantry was to keep food. Corey wishes his mom had listened to that, so then he'd have some food locked in there with him. Then again, his mom doesn't like to listen to anyone, especially not when they're trying to tell her what to do. Especially not when Corey is trying to talk to her.

* * *

Corey is seven when he develops cancer.

He's sitting on the hospital bed, legs crossed, reading a book with the help of one of the kind hospital ladies, but she's distracted. Her eyes keep darting away from the page to where his parents are talking to the man who wants to cut him open, but she keeps a hand on his back and it's comforting. Warm.

"I don't get it," his mom is saying, over and over again. "There's nothing wrong with either of us." She gestures to herself and then to his dad, who has an unlit cigarette hanging out of his mouth, clearly waiting until he can escape for a smoke break.

The cutting man explains to them, for perhaps the fourth or fifth time if Corey's been counting right (he might not have been, he's not very good at stuff like counting), that this is a very rare form of liver cancer that isn't hereditary, and it's simply awful luck that Corey has it.

"Got that right," his dad mutters, rubbing the crease between his eyebrows, and glancing back at his son, who's now trying to sound out the word 'fantastic' with the help of the kind hospital lady. "Listen, doc, how much is this going to cost?"

The cutting man inhales, and then asks whether they should talk about this more outside. His parents agree, and step outside, but not before his mom looks at him with annoyance, and something else that Corey can't recognise. It's not a nice thing, anyway, Corey can tell that much.

When they've gone, the kind hospital lady gently takes the book from his grip and takes his hands in hers. It's soft and smooth, unlike the few times he's felt his mom's or dad's hands, and warm and comforting too. "Hey, Corey," she says softly.

"Hey," he replies.

"Do you like your mom and dad?" She squeezes his hands a little tighter, and then shifts her other hand from his back and wraps it around his shoulders instead.

Corey shrugs, a little awkwardly now that she's half-hugging him. He leans into the warmth without thinking about it. "They do their best," he says. The words bring a half-repressed memory to his mind, unbidden, of his dad raising his hand and shouting _we're trying our best, Corey_ before bringing his palm down against Corey's cheek.

"What's their best like?" the kind hospital lady asks, quietly, and then maybe Corey imagines it but she sniffs like she's trying not to cry. Corey knows that kind of sniff well.

Corey frowns. What does that mean? He doesn't want to let this kind lady know how stupid he is, though, because then she won't like him either, so he tries to think of an answer to her question anyway. He ends up saying, "I'm not what they wanted."

"No?"

"They didn't want me. They have jobs and social lives and more important things to be doing than raising me," Corey parrots. He knows this list, because it's what his mom always says when she's yelling at his dad about how much she hates Corey.

She hugs him properly then, pressing her lips to the top of his head. Corey's seen moms do this when they drop their children at school, and it's actually quite nice. "Can I tell you a secret?" she mutters into his hair.

"Yes."

"I have a son. Year or so older than you, called Scott. He's the most important thing in my life, and that's how it should be." She pulls back, and her eyes are shining with tears. "Nothing should be more important than your own child."

Corey is alarmed by the tears. He's made the kind hospital lady cry, like he makes his mom cry, and he doesn't know how to help. He pats her shoulder, because once when he was crying at school a teacher patted his shoulder, and asks her to not cry so they don't get in trouble.

She starts at that, and looks up at him. "Why would I be in trouble for crying, sweetheart?" she asks.

"That's what happens when you cry," Corey informs her, kind of surprised she doesn't know this, and when she hurries out of the room with a hand pressed over her mouth and a muttered assurance that she'll be back soon he rolls the word 'sweetheart' around in his mind and thinks that it's a nice word.

* * *

A week later, the cutting man asks Corey how he'd been feeling recently. He sits on the end of the bed while the kind hospital lady sits next to Corey and strokes the hair that's steadily falling out. He relaxes into her touch while the cutting man asks him about if he'd been sick and had tummy ache and not felt very hungry.

Yes, yes and yes.

Why didn't you tell your parents?

I didn't want to bother them.

Why did you think you'd be bothering them?

At that point, the kind hospital lady interjects. "Maybe we could talk about this a bit later, Dr. Geyer?"

They exchange a look, the ones that adults do sometimes, over his head. Corey could tell from the way the cutting man raises his eyebrows slightly. He worries that he's said something wrong and that's why the kind hospital lady interrupted, but then the cutting man smiles at him so warmly that Corey doesn't think he's done anything wrong.

"Corey, would you mind if we asked you some more questions about your mom and dad? Maybe with some other people here?"

Corey frowns at him. Mom and Dad wouldn't like that. But, maybe, if he said something about them, they'd come visit him. "Okay," he says.

* * *

Two weeks after that, Corey has no hair. They're waiting on a liver transplant; the form of cancer he has is too aggressive and has spread too much to be treated with chemotherapy alone, the cutting man told his parents, but this will keep him going for longer while they wait.

Now, two men in uniforms are in the room, while the kind hospital lady holds his hands and the cutting man flicks through his chart. "Hi, Corey," one of the uniform men says, with a smile that makes Corey feel like he's going to be okay, and steps a little closer. "Mind if we talk to you a bit?"

Corey eyes them, then looks to the kind hospital lady. She smiles at him, all warmth, and nods. Corey nods too, looking at the uniform man. The other one has a clipboard, pen poised to take notes.

"Okay, Corey, we just want to chat a bit about your parents."

"Why?"

"Just to make sure they're taking care of you."

Corey starts to panic, but pushes it down. His feelings aren't important. "They're doing their best," he tells the uniform man. He hears the kind hospital lady sigh behind him and immediately feels guilty for making her worry.

The other uniform man scribbles down some notes.

The questions go on for a long time. Halfway through, the cutting man interrupts for a few minutes to check on Corey's heart and temperature, and finds everything fine. He pats Corey on the back affectionately, and Corey can't help but lean into the warmth of it.

He answers all of the questions as well as he can, and he thinks they're happy with him, but then he looks up when the kind hospital lady goes to join them and he sees that they're all frowning and his heart skips a beat because he's done something wrong. He thinks frantically over what he said to them.

 _Does your mom ever hurt you?_

 _No. Sometimes it hurts if I fall over in the dark, but that's my fault._

 _Fall over? In the dark?_

 _Yeah, in the pantry._

 _What are you doing in the pantry?_

 _That's where I go when I'm bad._

 _What do you do that's bad?_

 _Mom says I talk too loud. And too much. Dad is very tired after work and I make too much noise. I have to give them peace and quiet and I only do that in the pantry._

The kind hospital lady looks tired. So does the cutting man, and the uniform men. One of the uniform men, the one who was talking to him, comes over and crouches by the side of the bed to meet Corey's eyes.

"What school do you go to?"

Corey tells him.

"My son goes there. Year above you, I think. Stiles."

"I think I've heard of him."

The uniform man smiles at that. His eyes look sad still. "Corey, we need to tell you something that might be upsetting."

 _How about your dad? He gets annoyed when you make noise?_

 _Yeah, he gets stressed because he works hard._

 _Does he hurt you?_

 _He hits me sometimes._

 _Where?_

 _Anywhere._

They tell Corey that he's not going home with his parents for a long time. He feels cold for a second, then warm, then nothing.

* * *

Corey is nine when he gets a new liver, after being in and out of hospital for two years. When he's out, he now lives with his grandma. He loves his grandma, but he worries that he's a burden on her. He sees her take lots of pills, like he does, and knows that means she's not well. So he tries to keep quiet and out of trouble where he can.

When he's out of hospital – hopefully for good, Dr. Geyer tells him mock seriously, and the nurse Melissa smiles warmly at him so he knows for certain that it's a joke – he tries to get better at school, and his grandma hires a tutor so he can catch up on what he's missed.

After a while, Corey accepts that his parents were right and he is just stupid.

* * *

Corey is eleven when he wakes up late one morning. Afternoon, really – it's about two. And it's a Tuesday, so Corey should be at school. He frowns, wondering why his grandma didn't come and wake him up for school so they could eat breakfast together and then walk to the end of the road while talking about how Corey was going to do fine that day.

He pads along the corridor and knocks on her bedroom door, and again. And again. No response. He pushes open the door. Grandma is still in bed, still asleep, cold.

Corey tries to wake her up. It doesn't work.

* * *

They lied in the hospital.

Corey goes back to his parents. They attended a course, the Sheriff tells him, on parenting. And now that his grandma is dead, he can't stay there anymore. Don't worry, Sheriff Stilinski says to him, they passed the course.

But the _don't worry_ doesn't spread to his eyes.

* * *

Corey is thirteen when he moves back to Beacon Hills. It's a bigger house, which is nice. He's still with his parents, which isn't so nice.

Corey knows that his parents have been paying attention to their course because after nearly three years of living together again they haven't hit him once, and the new house doesn't even have a pantry so he doesn't have to worry about that.

He wouldn't say he loves them, though. That's a stretch.

He watches documentaries on the new laptop they get him for his fourteenth birthday a month later, and realises after several pet-related shows he is treated somewhat like a stray cat that everyone in the neighbourhood vaguely tolerates.

Except the neighbourhood is his parents, and he's not meant to be a stray anymore.

Corey pulls a blanket around him to try and feel warm.

* * *

At sixteen, Corey is really good at cooking meals and completing household tasks and learning to budget. He hasn't seen his parents for two months now, which is nice. They'll be back soon, but only for a few days. Four, at most, Corey guesses. They're happier living in the second home, which is closer to their jobs but more importantly further than Corey.

Corey thinks maybe that should upset him. Maybe it doesn't because he likes being further from his parents too.

He hasn't been hit or pushed or even shouted at since he was seven years old now. But somehow the silence is more suffocating than the abuse ever was. He tells Melissa that once (she comes to pick up Scott where her shifts allow her to, and every so often she bumps into Corey when she's waiting. She always wants to know how he's doing, but knows to respect his boundaries and very obvious want for privacy. Corey likes Melissa, likes how she listens without judgement even though Corey isn't a patient anymore), and she nods and says softly, "Even if it was bad attention, it was attention," and Corey stares at her dumbly for a few seconds before walking off without even acknowledging her words.

He calls in sick for the next three days.

The next time he sees her, she pretends the whole conversation never even happened, and they talk about how Corey thinks he's going to fail physics.

* * *

Corey is sixteen when he meets Mason.

Mason feels warm.

* * *

the format of this is kind of new for me and I also haven't written fanfiction full stop for like, two years PLUS i have never written for this fandom before so that's my excuse I guess

feedback would be awesome; like i said i love Corey and Mason and Mason/Corey and i will maybe probably definitely write more of them in the future but this is like testing the waters you know?

if my writing is trash then tell me and i will not post anymore, conversely, if it's not, tell me and i will post more (already have a semi-sequel of sorts to this in the works hahaoops)

love you guys and thank you SO MUCH for reading

i'm skimming over this and i feel like the quality of the writing kind of decreased the more i wrote but it's 2am and i have no inhibitions anymore


End file.
